Entrepreneurial development in Malaysia with specific reference to training and development initiatives

Abstract

The thesis aims at studying the Entrepreneurial Development initiatives in Malaysia with specific reference to training and development initiatives. The concept of entrepreneurial development itself suffers from a lack of consensus as to whether entrepreneurs can be developed or not. Gibb's model maintains that the development of entrepreneurs can be influenced. This is supported by empirical evidences from investigations in both developed and undeveloped countries. The Malaysian entrepreneurial development initiatives are targeted at the indigenous people known as the Bumiputera who do not form the business community of the country. The research issue is whether the emergence of Bumiputera entrepreneurs can be explained by the government initiatives that have tried to overcome (or compensate for) the disadvantages of their background and culture. In implementing the entrepreneurial development policy the Malaysian government creates a range of assistance. One of the most important instruments which the Malaysian government has used is entrepreneurial training aimed at overcoming the technical and management handicaps of the indigenous people who tend not to be exposed to the business/private sector. To analyse the role of entrepreneurial training and other development initiatives primary data have been collected from 202 respondents, out of which 200 were used in the final analysis. The results of the study show that the background and culture of the Bumiputera are important elements in understanding Bumiputera entrepreneurs. The general environment is not found as being important but the specific environment created by the various initiatives is found to be significant. It was found that the entrepreneurs themselves considered the initiatives as inadequate but nevertheless were benefitting from them. It was also found that there were no significant differences between the retailers and the manufacturers and the entrepreneurs in the developed and less developed areas of the country.